"Having spent hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising this product, De Beers is deeply concerned about anything that could damage the image of diamonds as a symbol of love, beauty, and purity,"
photo: Odd Andersen/AFP
The De Beers diamond cartel, which controls two-thirds of the $7 billion yearly trade in uncut diamonds and owns half the producing mines, has joined [in August 2000] the chorus against what are sanctimoniously called "blood diamonds," claiming it will not buy such stones and urging that all diamonds sold worldwide be attached to certificates of origin.
A number of liberal groups, most prominently Global Witness in London, have helped shape this campaign against the trade in "illegally" mined gems, which they say fuels wars on the African continent.
A closer look, however, demonstrates that this hullabaloo is not about halting wars and other conflicts in Africa--many of which the U.S., British, and French governments are deeply involved in. It is about [...] protecting the De Beers diamond cartel.
T.J. Figueroa
The Militant(Vol.64/No.33)
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Values
"We will make the most of all our resources especially our people and our country's diamonds. Planned and managed growth of our country's diamond industry will benefit the nation and it's people. Every employee will work hand in hand with the company to make the most of their opportunities for career growth and development with Debswana.Debswana (De Beers/Botswana) Diamond Company (Pty) Ltd
By looking at our world differently every day, we will find new and better ways of doing things. The way we do things today may not always be the best way. We are always ready to hear new ideas or try new and different ways of working. Our successes and mistakes are our lessons for the future."
History
De Beers, based in South Africa and the United Kingdom, has dominated the world diamond trade for more than a century. Its ownership structures are closely bound up with those of the Anglo American Corp., the vast South African conglomerate, of which it owns about 40 percent.
Both companies raked in massive profits from the labor of superexploited Africans driven off their land and into the mines, starting at the end of the 19th century. Later this brutal system was codified under apartheid white-minority rule. Both companies were bastions of support for the racist regime.
Diamonds were discovered in 1867 near Kimberley, South Africa, which became the source of the De Beers empire. It was no coincidence that Kimberley was also the birthplace in 1876 of South Africa's notorious pass laws--and mass trials of Africans for violating them--as De Beers and other mining capitalists sought to brand labor in a black skin as rightless.
De Beers was founded by Cecil Rodes, the infamous British colonizer. By the opening of the 20th century, De Beers controlled 90 percent of the international diamond trade. In response to falling prices during the depression of the 1930s, the company initiated a policy of buying up virtually all diamonds mined worldwide and bolstering its fortunes through monopoly pricing of the rock, which is mostly sold as a luxury jewelry item. De Beers today dominates the diamond trade not only through mining, but through its Diamond Trading Company, until recently called the Central Selling Organization, which controls most of world output.
T.J. Figueroa, ibid.
Deeper History
In 1867 a pretty pebble found near the Orange River, in the wilds of South Africa, was identified as a 21-carat diamond. Placer diamonds were found between the Vaal and Orange Rivers later in the year, and in March 1869 an 83-carat diamond turned up. By the end of 1870 there was a diamond rush, and by the end of 1871 two well-defined areas were recognized as the source areas, or "pipes", for the diamonds. Four pipes were discovered all together at the town of Kimberley. In 1872 the pipes were giant open quarries worked by 2500 miners and 10,000 hired laborers.
The Kimberley workings were 190 feet deep by 1875, and miners were hauling material out of the hole on aerial ropeways which covered the pit like spider webs. Soon the hauling was driven by machinery on the edge of the pit, and in 1875 the first steam-engine was installed. The cost of clearing away debris increased as the mines deepened, and slowly steam engines became necessary rather than optional. The rock became harder with depth, and by the end of the 1870s, the costs of mining became too great for one-man operations. The number of claim owners in the Kimberley pit dropped dramatically as people bought out their neighbors.
New investment poured in in 1880. Cecil Rhodes and seven partners owned a block of 90 claims in the De Beers Mining Company Ltd, named for its land holdings on the old De Beers ranch.
Rhodes was a successful politician, and he helped to draft laws that protected the mining companies. Taxation on mining profits was kept very low. The Diamond Trade Act was aimed at diamond stealing and smuggling, but it also set two very dangerous social precedents.
First, anyone found with an uncut diamond was required to explain how it came into his possession, that is, guilt was assumed while innocence had to be proved. This is a European concept, but is not usually found in English or American law.
Second, the Diamond Trade Act allowed the companies to set up "searching-houses" in a system of routine surveillance, searching, and stripping by company police. This curtailment of private rights and personal liberty became a fact of South African society. The companies were forced by strikes to be more lenient to their white workers than to blacks. The logical extension of this policy was to set up segregated, controlled, fenced-off compounds to house Africans for the length of their work contracts with the company: the first apartheid.
Chapter 15 Diamonds, Gold, and South Africa
Richard Cowen
Wider History
In 1870, however, huge diamond mines were discovered near the Orange River, in South Africa, where diamonds were soon being scooped out by the ton. Suddenly, the market was deluged with diamonds. The British financiers who had organized the South African mines quickly realized that their investment was endangered; diamonds had little intrinsic value -- and their price depended almost entirely on their scarcity. The financiers feared that when new mines were developed in South Africa, diamonds would become at best only semiprecious gems.
The major investors in the diamond mines realized that they had no alternative but to merge their interests into a single entity that would be powerful enough to control production and perpetuate the illusion of scarcity of diamonds. The instrument they created, in 1888, was called De Beers Consolidated Mines, Ltd., incorporated in South Africa. As De Beers took control of all aspects of the world diamond trade, it assumed many forms. In London, it operated under the innocuous name of the Diamond Trading Company. In Israel, it was known as "The Syndicate." In Europe, it was called the "C.S.O." -- initials referring to the Central Selling Organization, which was an arm of the Diamond Trading Company. And in black Africa, it disguised its South African origins under subsidiaries with names like Diamond Development Corporation and Mining Services, Inc. At its height -- for most of this century -- it not only either directly owned or controlled all the diamond mines in southern Africa but also owned diamond trading companies in England, Portugal, Israel, Belgium, Holland, and Switzerland.
De Beers proved to be the most successful cartel arrangement in the annals of modern commerce. While other commodities, such as gold, silver, copper, rubber, and grains, fluctuated wildly in response to economic conditions, diamonds have continued, with few exceptions, to advance upward in price every year since the Depression. Indeed, the cartel seemed so superbly in control of prices -- and unassailable -- that, in the late 1970s, even speculators began buying diamonds as a guard against the vagaries of inflation and recession. The diamond invention is far more than a monopoly for fixing diamond prices; it is a mechanism for converting tiny crystals of carbon into universally recognized tokens of wealth, power, and romance. To achieve this goal, De Beers had to control demand as well as supply. Both women and men had to be made to perceive diamonds not as marketable precious stones but as an inseparable part of courtship and married life. To stabilize the market, De Beers had to endow these stones with a sentiment that would inhibit the public from ever reselling them. The illusion had to be created that diamonds were forever -- "forever" in the sense that they should never be resold.
Have You Ever Tried to Sell a Diamond?
Edward Jay Epstein
Recent History
In early 1967, after a 12 year search, a team of De Beers geologists found abundant quantities of ilmenite and garnet - two of the chief indicators of diamondiferous kimberlite - near the village of Letlhakane in north-central Botswana. After further exploration, the pipe at Orapa was found later that year.
During the sampling and evaluation at Orapa, two smaller pipes were uncovered some 40 kilometres south-east of Orapa, near the Letlhakane village.
The De Beers Botswana Mining Company was formed on 23 June 1969 and in July 1971, Orapa Mine began production. By the time Letlhakane Mine was opened in 1975, the Government of Botswana had increased its shareholding in the company from 15 to 50 percent.
In 1973, De Beers geologists discovered the Jwaneng pipe, which would become the richest diamond mine in the world. It was officially opened by the former President of the Republic of Botswana, His Excellency Sir Ketumile Masire, in August 1982.
In 1991, the company changed its name to Debswana Diamond Company (Pty) Ltd and established its new corporate headquarters at Debswana House in Gaborone.
Damtshaa, the fourth Debswana mine, commenced production in October 2002. The mine is located some 25 km east of Orapa, from where it is administered.
The lucrative Debswana mines have contributed enormously to the economic growth of Botswana, not only in terms of direct foreign exchange and government revenues generated by diamond sales, but also through the multiplier effect on taxes, employment and infrastructure in remote areas.
Debswana produced approximately 28,4 million carats in 2002, making Botswana the largest producer of diamonds by value in the world.
Debswana (De Beers/Botswana) Diamond Company (Pty) Ltd
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De Beers Rebuts Accusations
The De Beers Group issued a statement denying accusations by human rights organization Survival International that De Beers' mining and exploration in Botswana's Central Kalahari Game Reserve caused Botswana's resettlement program for Bushmen tribes in the vicinity.
Botswana says it is conducting the resettlement to better provide health care, education and other development needs for the Bushmen, who migrated to the Central Kalahari after De Beers produced water in the area as an offshoot of a drilling exploration.
[...]
"Diamond mining does not require the removal or resettlement of any community ... indeed we welcome the presence of local populations to whom we can offer employment." De Beers also said Botswana's resettlement program applies to Bushmen throughout the country, not just in the Central Kalahari.
Professional Jeweler 15.Jul.02
Forbes Lists > World's Richest People > #103 >Nicky Oppenheimer
Africa's richest man derives most of his wealth from De Beers, the diamond giant he took private in 2001.
diamonds and gold
Israel long has been an established leader in the market for polished diamonds, selling 50 percent of all the stones worldwide and exporting $5.3 billion worth in 2000, up from $4.5 billion in 1999.
Until recently, not much had changed since the industry was established in 1936 by two Romanian immigrants who learned the polishing trade in Belgium.
The fledgling industry burgeoned during World War II, when European diamond centers fell under German occupation. At the time, Israel became a haven for European diamantaires, as diamond dealers are known, and a source for polished diamonds.
The industry's growth has depended on a reliable supply of rough, uncut diamonds -- and that supply is now in jeopardy.
Israel had relied heavily on the De Beers Group diamond syndicate to obtain a steady supply of pewter-colored rough stones that could be cut and polished for sale.
Last year, however, De Beers began limiting its number of rough diamond clients in Israel as part of a worldwide campaign to focus on mining and marketing, making it almost impossible for small- and medium-sized dealers to buy the gems.
"The genius in diamond deals is getting the" largest "percentage of rough, uncut diamonds," said Moshe Schnitzer, chairman of the Israel Diamond Institute and one of the founders of Israel's diamond bourse, the self-contained, four-building complex in Ramat Gan.
[...]
At present, 95 percent of the world's rough diamonds are marketed by the De Beers Group, which has become known by its marketing arm DTC since partnering with the luxury products group LVMH - Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SA - to create an independent company marketing premium diamond jewelry.
Industry changes put Israel's diamond trade in the rough
Jessica Steinberg/JTA 03.Aug.01
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An Israeli tycoon is helping to force De Beers to surrender its control of the world's diamond market.
Economist UK 15.Jul.04
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gold and diamonds
The 'Bushmen' are the oldest inhabitants of southern Africa, where they have lived for at least 20,000 years. Their home is the vast expanse of the Kalahari desert.
There are many different Bushman peoples - they have no collective name for themselves, and the terms 'Bushman', 'San', 'Basarwa' (in Botswana) and so on are used variously. Most of those which are widely understood are imposed by outsiders and have some pejorative sense; many now use and accept the term 'Bushmen'. They speak a variety of languages, all of which incorporate 'click' sounds represented in writing by symbols such as ! or /.
The case began in July 2004, but has faced severe delays. Nine witnesses have given evidence so far, and it took twenty days for the court to hear Albertson's evidence alone. This week government lawyer Sidney Pilane announced that he planned to call thirty witnesses to the box. Pilane seemed set to delay proceedings even further by objecting to every question posed by the Bushmen's lawyer.
The controversy surrounding the case recently took a new twist - the government is pushing a bill though parliament to remove Bushman protection from the Constitution. The clause to be scrapped forms the central plank of the Bushmen's case.
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Until the beginning of the eighteenth century all known diamonds came from the Golconda region near Hyderabad in India. Pliny wrote an incredible account of how diamonds were found in an inaccessible valley. The locals threw meat into the valley and the diamonds stuck to it. Eagles carried off the meat to their nests from which the diamonds were recovered.
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Bushmen and Diamonds: (Un)civil society in Botswana by Kenneth Good
reviewed by Richard Bartlett at African Review of Books
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Exiles of the Kalahari
Mother Jones Magazine Jan/Feb 2005
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The Diamond Invention
Edward Jay Epstein
